beautiful temple and evil mind

On my way from lunch at an Indian restaurant, I dropped by a temple named "Anraku-ji" with my family.

It was founded about 1200 year ago by a famous priest "Gyouki".

However, there was a big fire a few hundred years ago, the temple was build in Edo era, 350 years ago. The photo is one of the temple buildings, an awesome tower. It's beautiful!

Anyway, when I parked my car at the parking lot, there was Ojizou-sama, a stone-made Bodhisattva (holy statue) at the corner.

A man standing in front of it, prayed aloud something. As we were passing by, I heard he was saying " God, He*****(the real name of someone) is EVIL. You must punish him very, very, very hard!"

He CURSED!!!!

Too scary to hear any more.

The scariest thing in the world is human evil mind, right?

Partial Solar Eclipse

It was very interesting to see the sun became thinner and thinner.

The eclipse of the sun .... the great show of the universe!

From here, around Tokyo, we could see Partial solar eclipse.
About three quarters of the sun was hiding behind the moon.

Though the missing 3/4 of the sun, you couldn't say it was darker.
The brightness didn't change at all. It was amazing.

The next total solar eclipse will be in 2035.
What an exciting thing is that we can see it near Tokyo.

Isn't that GREAT????

You don't tell me how old I will be!!!!

baby swallows and a new pigeon family

It was last summer that a couple of swallows made a nest and brought up 4 young ones.

This summer, they...the same couple? ....came again and have their big family.

This couple already brought up 4 young birds and the youngsters lest their nest in May.
After the young ones left, mother swallow hadn't left and had sat still in the nest.
She had been holding next other eggs!

This is the photo of the second youngsters I took this morning.

They are so cute!

Here is another photo of another bird story.

I found a couple of pigeon was making a nest in my garden.
A female one is sitting all days but I don't see any eggs.

Birds are very careful animal.

Swallow is known very well to have their nests at the places where people live.

But pigeons are different.....

It is a great opportunity to see the nature in front of my eyes, isn't it??

Summer festival

Two-days summer festival "Gion-matsuri" is held in my city.

I went to the festival with my family.
It was very hot and humid yesterday.

First, my daughter played scooping goldfish.

She scooped NINE tiny red goldfish.

Gee.....that's too much...

Then, I bought a drink .... a beer.

This is the Japanese beer brand KIRIN.

Gooood!!!

This is "o-mikoshi" a portable shrine.

There were some of them, and they were carried by a lot of people.
They walked very slowly with shouting rhythmically.

Too many people to move forward.
At last, we couldn't move and felt a bit dangerous with kid.
We decided to go home.

It was fun but......tired.

prayers

Micheal Jackson died.

I was a teenager in 80's.

80's....a golden age of Rock and Pop music.

I stayed late at night to see MTV and I love them.

It was why I studied English....

Michael was a real music icon. He was just great.

The death of Farrah Fawcett was also shocked to me.

She was so beautiful and seemed so healthy.

My prayers and thoughts go to them.

the Ghibli Museum

Do you know "My neighbor Totoro" and "Nausicaa of the valley of the wind"?

These are the masterworks of Studio Ghibli.

I went to the Ghibli Museum with my 10-year-old daughter last Monday.

Though it was a weekday, it was very crowded.

We had to wait for about 20 minutes to play with Neko bus *a cat-bus*.
And we also had to wait for about 30 minute to have a tea time at the cozy and comfortable cafe.

In general, the museum is great. I bet you can have fun and enjoyable time there.

However you shoud be prepared for yelling, shouting and screaming of a lot of little kids!

long time no see!

There was a gathering, kind of *re-union* last Saturday.

A linguistic professor in the US who was my high school English teacher
has been back home in Japan.
We, I mean, ex-students have a party, while he is in Japan.

Almost 20 years ago, he quit high school teacher soon after we graduated
to study abroad in the United States.

It was hard to become a university professor especially in a foreign country.
He was a very strict and stubborn teacher, but he was also strict and stubborn to himself.

I liked his teaching English and organizing class, but some students didin't.

He was a very unique teacher.

Anyway, after 20 years later, we, students, all became adults,
some have very responsible jobs and
some are parents to kids.
Married, devorced and remarried......

We got a lot of beer and *sake*
and were chatting all the time,
everyone got drunk....

You can't tell who is the professor!

Ammonite

I went to the Tokyo International Mineral Fair.

You can see and buy a lot of stones.

I like fossils....the history of lives from ancient times....

I bought an polished ammonite and put it near my pc.

It is good to feel the weight of the smooth and cold fossil stone.
And it's fun to imagine that it was floating in the ancient deep sea.

Wow....at last, several hundred million years later, you are in my hands now!!!!

the third library

There are three libraries in my city.

I usually go to two of them.
One is near my house, and another is in front of the station.
They are very convenient to go.

I always wanted to go to the third one because it is the largest one in the city.
However, I didn't know where it is.

This morning, I thought "today is the day."

I rode my bike and aimed to the largest library!
I didn't know where the library exactly is, but I can go nearby.

But.......I was lost........ :-(

I asked three people, two ladies and one gentleman.

What do you think did they say!?

The ladies said "sorry, I don't know." and the gentleman said "ah.....I can't explain how to go to the library...." with his MAP!

I thought the Japanese is the people who like reading books than the ones in other countries.

Anyway,

at last, finally, I could find the third library.

Gee... it was a very long way...





They

test, test, test!!!

My daughter had an intermediate test last week.

Though she doesn't like to study (every kid doesn't) , I taught her English and math and how to study science and history.

Gee... she got a good score! Actually, the best she ever had!!!!

I didn't know how she would do.

It's great to know that she can do it if she do and she was also happy with her achievement.

One month later, there will be a semester test.

Yes, we can!

economy

My husband runs his own buisiness related to indivisual investment matters.

To understand what he is doing, I am studying economics.

I don't have any economic background, so I read economic books in Japanese to get more technical terms. Then, I read CNN and WSJ through the internet.

It's amazing that the economy moves the world so fast and infects us so quickly and siriously.

cellphone...was washed

I washed my cellphone.......

I had been looking for it, but I didn't take it seriously.
I had thought I just put it where I couldn't remember and I would find it sooner or later when I wouldn't expected that.

Then, in the next morning, I found it in the washing machine!!
I regret that I asked my husband to do laundry.....
He never checked the laundries, I mean, every pockets of everyone's cloths.

It's my fault...

Wisdom Tooth

I went to a dental clinic to pull my upper-left wisdom tooth two days ago.

I estimated it was easy, but it was not at all.

Almost of the tooth was buried, so the dentist cut in two pieces and pulled them hard.

That made a big hole (a big deep cut) , so he stitched.

After an OPERATION, the left side of my face is swelling....I can't stand that.

Teaching

Teaching is difficult....especially when you teach your own children.

My 13 yo daughter had a semester test and the result was seriously bad.

I had been optimistic about her learning ability.

I regret that I didn't teach her much. I did, in fact, but it was not enough at all.

So, I've started teaching her all subjects with different approach.
I also want to show her how to study and learn various things.

I hope it works.

Unfortunate on Friday 13

A friend of mine had a car accident on Feb. 13, FRIDAY!!!!!

She was going to turn right, and then, a car came straight forward to her and they crushed.
The driver didn't see the signal (didn't notice her car) and more, he had drove faster than the legal speed limit, more than 30~40 km/h!!
She was a totaly, 100%, victim.

She was carried to the hospital by an ambulance and stayed for almost ten days.

The accident broke her pelvis. There were no damages except that crack.
She said it was lucky that only she was in the car. If her kids were with her, she said, they would be fatally injured, if worse, they might be dead.

My thoughts and prayers with her and her family.

Getting warmer and warmer

They say spring has come earlier than usual in Japan.

Global warming? I agree with that.

I like winter better than summer.

I love walking in the morning chilly air.

Though, it's hard to motivate myself to get up early in the morning!

tomorrow is Valentine's Day!

I made chocolates with my daughter for Valentine's Day.

In Japan, girls and women give chocolates to boys and men whom they love on Valentine's Day.

I don't make sweets usually, but it's fun to make them with my little ladies.

My teenage one is going to give hand-made chocolates (including heart-shaped one!) to
her boyfriend.

Gee...she isn't my little kid anymore!

Just older

I found a BonJove CD album "Crush" at the second-hand corner in a CD shop.
I didn't have that so I rescued the CD and it costed only ￥380!!
I was sorry it's too cheap!! :-(

Anyway, the songs are great!
My favorite one in the CD is "Just Older."

He sings "It's not old, just older", "like my favorite pair of torn blue jeans...."

Aging is not negative thing, right?

Holidays are over

My high school football team lost the game on January 2.
It was so close. The score was 0-0, they lost at PK.....sigh...

Anyway, skiing was great.
I did ski after 15 years. The last time I had skied was before I 'd got married.
It was fun to ski with my daughters so I want to go skiing again before winter ends.

Finally, school begins tomorrow.
I have to clean up my house!

a Happy New Year!

New year begins.
Last december was a really year-end crunch...
But it's not an excuse that I didn't write this blog, three lines a day...

I want to develop my English and myself this year! I have to!!

There are some plans for new year's holiday.

1. watching a football game on Jan 2 (tomorrow!)

My high shool football team won the first prize last year at our district tournament and is playing at national tournament to be the No.1 in Japan!

2. skiing!

I am going to ski with my family! according to a weathercast, there are a lot of snow there!